Developing and Validating an Instrument for Assessing Secondary Students' Self‐Efficacy for Online Reading

ABSTRACT This study develops and validates the Self‐Efficacy for Online Reading Questionnaire (SEORQ), a process‐grounded instrument designed to assess secondary students' self‐efficacy for enacting the core demands of online reading. We generated items from established models of online reading and multiple‐source comprehension and refined them through expert review and content validity analyses, yielding an initial pool of 40 items. We administered the questionnaire to 597 middle‐ and high‐school students and randomly split this sample for exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses. EFA supported a five‐factor structure and retained 34 items representing Task‐Oriented Reading, Locating, Source Evaluation, Integrative Comprehension, and Metacognitive Regulation. CFA demonstrated acceptable model fit, with all items loading significantly on their intended factors. All subscales and the total scale showed strong internal consistency. Using multigroup CFA, we established configural, metric, and scalar invariance across gender and configural invariance across school level, indicating developmental sensitivity in item functioning. We collected an independent sample ( n = 268) to examine additional validity evidence. Analyses supported convergent validity with an existing online reading self‐efficacy measure, discriminant validity relative to broader motivational constructs, and predictive validity through significant relations with online reading performance. Overall, the SEORQ advances measurement by aligning self‐efficacy judgments with authentic online reading processes and offers practical utility for research, diagnosis, and formative evaluation in digital literacy instruction.